'Either We Heal Now As A Team Else We Die As Individuals'

The contest between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton is tearing the Democrat's apart.

The fact is this; large bodies of world public opinion are sick and tired of the way American governments conduct themselves on the world stage.

By Citizen Correspondent Darrell Goodliffe

Date Posted: 03/23/08

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Nobody should underestimate the historic significance of the coming General Election in November. This significance has nothing to do with the fact that it will see either the first black or women candidate for President and everything to do with the fact that the Democrats have a historical opportunity to bury the Neo-conservative ideological project, personified by the Republican Party and George Bush. Given that context the individual battle between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama pales into insignificance.

First let me declare my hand; I, like a lot of people the world over, greatly admire Barack Obama's campaign and have drawn a lot of inspiration and hope from it; in fact it's one of the main reasons I am back in politics as anything other than a writer and commentator. I greatly resent the way Clinton voted on Iraq and see massive flaws in her campaign, her claims of greater experience are overblown and dubious to say the least when on several occasions she has proven to be a rankly incompetent legislator.

Questions also remain about the extent to which her and her husband used high office to feather their own nest; having said that and although it was clearly a political gambit, her offer of the vice-presidency should not have been treated in such a dismissive way by Obama.

Comments by the advisers of both sides have not helped; Samantha Powers was out of line calling Clinton a monster and Geraldine Ferraro was just plain dillusional in her comments. The furore over Jeremiah Wright has damaged Obama but the very fact that it has damaged him has not reflected well on either side. It is ironic and sad that John McCain, who recently suspended a member of his campaign for trying to use it, is called upon to restore decency; he is right, it should defiantly not be an issue but when has Clinton come out and unequvically said the same thing as she should have done?? Instead she has been happily to silently profit from the affair which again adds to my dislike of her personally and her campaign.

Obama's race is, if anything, a handicap as it has allowed the subtle questioning of his patriotism to become easier.